Questions of Bonds

It was early morning on a Saturday. Mykel had to leave proceeding breakfast that morning to go sign the papers in order to gain the space with which to open his new tattoo shop.

Liz was up with the sun, already having a pot of coffee brewing when Mykel and I dragged our half-dead carcasses down the stairs.

Liz is and always has been a regular early riser, much to the opposite effect of her younger, though much bigger brother.

We enjoyed a jovial breakfast together that Liz had been preparing, being the early bird she is when we came downstairs that morning.

Things had been...I'm not quite sure really...restive and the unquiet anxiety that was building between Mykel and me was becoming insurmountable. While he laughed during breakfast, I saw the small glances he kept sending me. The pained look in his eyes.

The kiss we had shared several days before had...taken me for a ride. The way his lips felt, the way his hands felt when he held onto my hips...my heart still flutters at the thought...

But there was still so much he didn't know about me. So much I was too afraid to tell him. I couldn't stand seeing the look of disgust disfigure the beauty of his face. To see those honey-wheat colored eyes darken with enmity and virulence. After he and I went to bed that night, I lay awake for hours, feeling the peace of his arms around me. Wondering if this was what love really felt like.

I inhaled him, breathing in his pheromones, making me dizzy with infatuation and something a bit more, before every single feeling of peace and safety plunged, shattering in the darkened hole of my soul.

Do you really think you deserve this? Are you actually beginning to believe that you're worthy of love? That someone could love a disgusting little scab like you?

The voice was my mother's, hard and cold and unfeeling. Whispering in my ear as she had done so many times before.

You're nothing. Less than nothing. You amount to less than maggots on dog shit. Didn't I teach you anything? You'll never be more than a pathetic little whore.

Tears began to leak slowly from my eyes. I knew the words to be true. My own parents couldn't find love for me...not a single shred of human decency...neither had anyone else. The men...I was nothing but a paid-for hole to fuck...sometimes just a hole to take...

I was nothing. At least that's what I thought. What I had been taught to think. I still battle, even now, in keeping that in the past tense. I was never nothing and not...I am nothing...Mykel is teaching me, but I still have yet to master that particular skill. Sometimes that voice comes hauntingly back, from the depths of my memory bank like a krakin waiting for a hapless victim. Every time it dissolves me into a blubbering mess. During those moments Mykel comes and gently sweeps up my broken pieces and glues them back together again.

What I have never told him is that sometimes I'm afraid one day there will not be any whole pieces left to put me back together again, simply fragments with too many holes to keep stable.

He did not wake to my cries that night as I began to mourn what I thought could never be.

Liz noticed the strain between us, the tension in my body at his presence, but kept silent, waiting patiently for the right moment to bring it up. That moment was that morning after Mykel left.

He stood from the breakfast table, his eyes sliding to me before quickly looking away again. I closed my eyes in a failed attempt to not catch the confusion, rejection, and sorrow that had been hovering around him the last few days. I didn't have to see it to feel it.

After setting his plate in the sink he turned and smiled at Liz, though the smile was not as bright as usual. She smiled back, worry etched across her features as she glanced between us.

"I'll be back later tonight. If all goes well I'll have a lot of things to cover today. I'll text you and let you know what's going on."

Liz nodded and pulled him into a hug. "Be safe. Good luck. Mykel," she called to him as he reached the front door.

Nothing more was said, but they shared an unspoken conversation at the end of which, Mykel looked almost resigned. He left with a sad glance in my direction and the smallest upturn of his lips.

After he had left Liz studied me for a long, arduous moment before she turned, pouring more coffee into the mugs we had used during breakfast. She went to the living room coming back a moment later with a wooden box with a small brass latch at the front.

"Come sit with me. Let's watch the sun finish rising." Her voice was gentle but I could tell the difference between a gentle demand and a request.

I grabbed my coffee, thinking as I did so that I was going to need a much more sufficient supply of the favored caffeinated beverage, and followed her outside. We sat on the swing, our legs slightly touching, our arms lighting brushing together as we moved. I sat silently as she opened her box and pulled out a cigar that had been gutted of its original contents and rerolled with marijuana that exuded a strong aroma.

She lit it, closing her eyes as she inhaled the substance into her lungs, holding it a moment before exhaling a cloud of smoke. The wind blew, whipping the smoke around our heads before it dissipated completely. She hit it again before passing it to me.

We were silent, slightly swinging, the movement controlled unconsciously by our feet before she spoke, smoothly and without malice. "What's going on between you and Mykel?"

I looked at her. "Nothing," I answered simply. That word felt like a stab in the chest.

She studied me for a moment. "Is that the problem?"

"What problem?" I asked, feigning ignorance.

"Come on, Mattie. Don't play stupid with me. Both of you have been mopping around for the last few days like someone drowned your puppy."

The thought of drowning made my throat close and I took a deep drag to keep myself under control. I smiled at the gained knowledge that Mykel had not told her about what my parents had done to me.

"I'm not trying to hurt him," I said, my voice already becoming thick with unshed emotion.

"What are you trying to do then?" She glanced at me then, smoke sliding from her nostrils like a dragon's.

I shook my head and looked away, feeling my weakness building. "I don't want to hurt him, Liz. But...I don't want to be hurt, either. That's all I've known...hurt. And I'm...I'm so fucking scared." I took a hit then to calm my shaking nerves. I ignored the tears as they made their descent down my face. "I'm scared to fall in love with him, Liz." I laughed without any hint of humor and so much heartbreak Liz took my hand, lacing it with hers. "And I could so easily. I...there's still so much you two don't know about me. And...what if...what if you find-find out and...it changes your view of me? I'm broken and dirty and so beaten in...don't you see, Liz?" I looked at her with despairing desperation. "The two of you, working at the cafe...are the only good things I have in my life. What if you find out what I am...where I've been...and you hate me?"

She looked at me, her eyes softening, and drew her arm around my shoulders. "Mattie, what you've been through...whatever you had to do to survive...whatever your past holds...is not going to influence how we feel for you now."

I shook my head in denial at her words. Words that both began to heal my tattered soul and broke my heart. Liz took the coffee mug from my hands and along with hers placed it on the deck at our feet.

She moved over to me so that our bodies were touching to our ankles. Her fingers found my hair and began playing with the surrounding curls. "Do you really think so lowly of us, Mattie?" she asked me. Her voice was low and saddened, and I hated myself even more to be the cause. "Of me?" she added. She wasn't looking at me. She was looking beyond the yard, tracing the mountain ridges with her eyes.

"No," I whispered. "I hold you in the highest regards. I think that lowly of myself." I paused and took a deep breath.

Liz took that moment to relight the blunt that had died as we were talking. She hit it and handed it to me. As I inhaled I felt the herb course through my bloodstream. My heart slowed. The shaking of my hands soothed, my nerves calmed.

I exhaled.

"The last three years have been the best of my life, Liz. And it's because of you. You gave me a job. My first real job. You helped me when no one else would.

"I can never adequately express to you what you've done for me. Nor can I ever repay you." I took another hit. "I never had a reason to smile before, Liz. I've never had a friend, I've never had...love, Liz. Not before you. And I'm scared. And...a whole lot of other things and the thought of losing it, losing you...I don't want to be who I was before...and I may not be doing very well at getting better, but I couldn't handle going back to the life I lived before."

I choked. I could not say more. Liz did not press me.

"Mattie," she said after a while, "listen to me, and listen carefully..." She linked our hands together once again and kissed the back of my hand. "I love you, sweetheart. How could I have turned you away when you came in my door?" She smiled, almost sadly, as now she has the slightest bit more understanding of my state at that point. "Soaking wet, no jacket, no umbrella, freezing cold. You looked like a wet baby duck with poofed-out feathers." We both laughed softly. She gently wiped my face, the action igniting such a reaction inside me that I felt like I would burst.

"I had to take you in. You seemed so lost that day," she said in hindsight, her voice low and analyzing. She didn't have enough of the pieces of my jigsaw puzzle to complete the picture just yet. I still could not tell her yet.

"I am lost, Liz. I'm no less lost now than I was then...the only difference is I don't get rained on at night, and my shoes don't have holes in them.

"Everything is still new. Except for pain and loss and self-loathing. And I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop."

I squeezed her hand then, despondency filling my every pore, so afraid that she would run from me forever toward the mountains in the distance if I did not keep a firm enough grip.

"I don't want to lose you. Or Mykel, for that matter. But I'm so fucking scared, Liz, that it's all gonna fall out from under me." I swiped at my eyes and sighed, dropping my hand heavily into my lap.

"Mattie, baby, look at me," she told me softly. I did. The look in her eye made my heart ache in past loneliness, and it made it pound a bit harder at the thought of some kind of permanency. "You're not going to lose me. I don't know how to make you believe that I'm not going anywhere than to prove it to you. We all have dark sides to our past, baby. Everyone is running from something."

"Mykel said the same thing," I said allowing myself a small smile. I looked at her then, closely, and saw dark memories behind her eyes. "What are you running from, Liz?"

Liz's eyes filled, unwillingly if the look on her face said anything about the tears. Liz is not generally an overly emotional person. That's not to say she's cold and unfeeling. But unlike me, especially then, is not controlled by them.

"I need another blunt if we're going to do this sharing thing, okay?" she said. I nodded and watched her. She concentrated hard on breaking open the tobacco leaf, emptying its contents, carefully placing the ground-up flower in the leaf, and delicately rolled it up. Her face was of pure concentration, but I knew that the mechanics of blunt rolling wasn't what had her stymied.

She lit it and took several, large hits from the end before passing it. She hit it with ease from years of long practice. Her lungs knew exactly what they were doing. Me, I was a novice in the art of pot-smoking in general, from any device; consequently, I was a coughing mess most of the time.

"When I was nineteen, the summer before my sophomore year of college, I was coming home from a club. Not a big drinker, even before this, I'd much prefer this." She held up the blunt she'd just hit, exhaled, and hit it again.

She stared at the cherry, watched the smoke rise in twirling strands of burning herbs.

"The guy I was with...well, we were friends. Had been for, god, years. Well, that night I decided to have some drinks. I had too many. When he took me home he raped me on my living room floor. I lived in a small apartment not far from campus. Our brother Taylor...he, uh...came in right as he...finished. He hadn't heard from me when I said I was gonna call him and something told him to check on me. He pulled him off of me and almost beat him to death right there. Well, anyway, I got pregnant from it. I had planned on keeping it. Her. It wasn't the baby's fault. And I didn't make the decision to keep her out of some pro-life bullshit, that was just my choice.

"Well." She took another hit and wiped her eyes. I had a fair idea of what was coming since I had been here almost two weeks now and I hadn't seen any children or any evidence thereof.

"Taylor made himself my personal bodyguard. He moved in and finished his senior year of high school online so he could live with me. I was five months through the pregnancy and I miscarried. I, uh...I can't ever have children. He...damaged my insides too badly during...that I...won't ever be able to carry long term. I'll always lose it."

I was silent for a long while, not needing words. Not having words to say either way. I just pulled her to me as she had so often done to me in the past several years.

She wept lightly in my arms; the grief of that loss never fading.

We smoked another blunt to settle razzled nerves after she sat back up, finally composed. She smiled at me, her eyes still slightly shining.

"You hungry?" she asked with a faux pas smile on her face. "I'm gonna go make some lunch. Come keep me company." She stood grabbing her box on the way.

"Liz," I said as I reached out, snagging her free hand as she tried to rush past me. She looked at me like she was breaking and she just wanted to forget. I drew her into a hug, long and sensual, and conveying so many things unspoken.

That night Mykel came home with a smile on his face. His eyes shined brightly. And then he smiled at me, a different smile. His face lit up a different way. His eyes shined a bit brighter at that moment.

I smiled at him, slow and shy. I felt my face beginning to redden. I broke eye contact before my smile slid away.

He'll never accept you. You're nothing but a beaten whore.

"You look happy," Liz said smiling. She ran her fingers through my hair and sent me a small smile as she passed me.

"Yes!" Mykel exclaimed excitedly. "Space was great. Perfect size. I signed all the contracts and everything's in order. I can begin moving in as soon as everything is cleared out."

Mykel danced on the balls of his feet, his smile splitting his beautiful features. Liz hugged him, jumping up to reach his neck. He caught her, spinning around.

He set her down laughing. "You know, if you didn't wiggle around like a psycho, the odds of my dropping you reduce significantly."

She slapped his shoulder, Liz does not like being picked up.

"Jerk. If you wouldn't pick me up, I wouldn't have to worry about being dropped."

I chuckled at them and wondered again what it would be like if circumstances had been different with my sister and me. Would we have grown up close? Stuck up for each other to the schoolyard bullies. Would we be close now? Would I know if she was even alive?

"Let's celebrate!"

Liz looked between us. "Those are dangerous words, little brother." She smiled. "You remember the last time you said those words?"

My eyes bounced between them, a small smile creeping up on my face at the look that crossed Mykel's. I hugged a couch pillow to my chest, trying to keep the melancholy leaden anxiety from overcoming me.

"Oh, god, Liz, don't remind me of that night." Mykel covered his face with his hand and laughed, then he glanced over at me. There was a flicker of emotion in his eyes, he blinked and it was gone as if it were never there at all.

"My twenty-first birthday her and Kaiden..." He paused then and even Liz's smile wavered. "They took me to my first gay bar and got me absolutely hammered. There was a drag queen show going on that night and Kaiden..." He paused again at that name. The sadness in his voice at the mention of that name made me ache and long to take away his pain.

"He talked to one of the queens and she pulled me on stage and had my drunk ass up there singing 'Its Raining Men'."

We all laughed. Me from the vision of the night in reference, them to the memory.

"Maybe we should be a little bit...lower in key this time, whatcha think?" Liz said. "I'm too old for that shit now."

Mykel laughed. "That's what you said back then."

"And it's no less true now!" she said, her eyes wide. Liz laughed before she sat back on the couch, her back against part of my shoulder and chest as she leaned into me. "I'm not sure if little Mattie here is up for that kinda excitement."

I glared at her. "Excuse me...'little Mattie'?"

She giggled and kissed my cheek. "You're so tiny. You're even smaller than I am."

However true that might have been wasn't the point. My lack of stature notwithstanding, I didn't like it to be pointed out in such ways. They both just laughed.

"I was thinking more like you run to the store while I take a shower and get some Jose and some margarita mix and we have a few drinks here. Still got that primo rolled up in your box?" Mykel said as he stretched standing from the couch.

Liz smirked. "Don't I always? Yeah, I suppose I could do that for you. I guess I'll be back then." She turned her head, moving back slightly to get a better look at me. "You riding with?"

Mykel seemed interested in this question as well. He hovered a few feet away trying not to look like he was really paying attention.

I shook my head. "No." I tried not to make eye contact with Mykel as I answered. "S-stores make me nervous."

Liz nodded and kissed my cheek. "Okay, love. I'll be back then, boys."

I smiled at Liz, telling her to be safe, all the while watching Mykel's face. He was frowning, just slightly. He looked hurt and confused.

I smiled worriedly at him, meeting those eyes. He looked down and I saw him swallow heavily.

"Well, I'm gonna go shower. I'll, uh...I'll be right back."

He walked away without waiting for a response. I watched him go upstairs, my eyes following him. I sighed.

What was this...thing...this...this spark that seemed to ignite within me? I hugged the pillow closer to my chest and rested my chin on it. I closed my eyes. Why did it affect me so much that he looked so sad? Why have I, these last few nights wanted him to sleep next to me, to hold me?

I'm always so cold. All the time, always cold. It is like my body refuses to hold its own heat, and I needed a heat source for survival like I needed food for energy. I thought of that night when I asked him not to leave me and he had stayed. He had held me; I felt so warm. I felt safe.

That day he helped me through the shower and I allowed the moment to escape me and I kissed him; I panicked. I panicked because I had never done anything like that before. I am not nor ever was an impulsive person. But I have to admit I loved the way his lips felt against my skin, and impulse took over.

He had deepened the kiss, pulling me closer to him. He pulled away and smiled. When he left to go get dressed everything went to shit.

My thoughts took over. My fears and worries and anxieties heightened and amplified. I began immediately to pull back away from him. Not letting him touch me. Not letting him get too close.

I knew he was hurt by the sudden behavioral reversal. Especially when it seemed that Liz and I were growing all the closer as whatever progress he and I had made toward anything more than awkward passing was a fool's dream.

What I had told Liz was true. I was scared of losing them. I was terrified of falling in love with him because I knew, even then, how easy that would be. But what if it turned out he didn't love me like he thought. What if he left me? What if I wasn't good enough? What if I didn't make him happy? What if he realized that he'd be better off without me?

The thoughts ran through my mind in chaotic circles. Why did I have to be so damned scared? Why did I have to be such a coward? My heart pounded.

Would it be so bad? Allowing myself to become that vulnerable. It could be. There was still so much standing in my way. In our way. I sighed just as he came into the room. He looked at me with a question in his eyes. He wanted to ask, but he said nothing.

Then he stopped and turned toward me, that sad look still in his eyes. "You want something to drink?"

I looked at him then and he smiled. His look changed when I smiled back and I felt the heat rising up to my cheeks.

"Yes, please. If you don't mind." I looked down feeling tenuous and unguarded.

"I don't mind, Mattie."

When I looked back up he was gone, and I had the sinking feeling that despite the waging war between my heart and that scared boy inside my soul, the fight was lost before it really began. I did not know what was coming in the near future. I did know, however, whether I got my heart ripped from my chest and I would lose everything, or I would allow myself to fall in love and finally find what I had been looking for since I was a boy, this was something I needed to do.

I did know one thing for sure...either way it would be an adventure.

He came back with the drinks and sat beside me. His energy was an amalgamation of apprehensive nervousness, caution, and fortification of will.

"Are, um, are y-you excited about signing all the paperwork f-for your-"

"Mattie." He interrupted my stuttering attempt to cover the fact that I was awash with nerves that he was sitting so close to me. Closer than he'd come to me in days. "Why have you been avoiding me?"

I sighed. "Can we talk about this later, Mykel? Please? I promise...later. But not now okay? Can we have an easy night before we get into the hard stuff?"

Mykel smiled easily at me, his body relaxing at the promise of some sort of an explanation. I promised myself I would try and relax tonight and have a good time. Laugh and be silly.

Liz came home not long after, groaning about the "stupid people" she had to deal with at the store.

"Ugh," she said as she turned off the blender and poured the green icy liquid into three mugs with salt along the rim. "I can't believe that bitch!" She said handing Mykel and me our glasses. "Seriously? Does my shopping cart full of shit and my leggings and baggy t-shirt scream "employee" to you? Oh! and on top of that! this bitch wants to grab me. Hell no! I pinned her ass against the shelves of the canned food aisle."

Mykel laughed. "You didn't?"

Liz took a long drink of her margarita and looked incredulously at her brother. "You know very well I did. She looked very surprised." She rolled her eyes again. "Then!" she continued, "this stupid bitch goes and finds a manager! Saying how she's gonna get me fired! Then has an argument with the manager on how I don't fucking work there! It was ridiculous."

I laughed and licked the side of the glass before taking a drink, imitating what they had done. I made a face, alcohol not being something that my taste buds were quite used to.

Mykel chucked. "You okay there, mon bonheur?" He looked surprised that the endearment slipped. He had not called me that in almost a week since I told him it would be better if I slept alone.

Liz looked at him strangely, her glass halfway to her lips. No one said anything for a moment before Liz cleared her throat, and took a deep gulp.

"Hey, so who's up for Cards Against Humanity?"

Both of their jaws dropped when I said I had never played. The game lasted most of the night. Mykel sat directly across from me, his eyes boring into mine at certain moments. I smiled, trying to keep my heart from leaping from my chest, trying to keep my anxieties from overtaking me completely.

I had tried to put what was ahead of me aside and concentrate on the now. The laughter. The jokes. The easy display of jovial mannerisms as we lay down our cards.

I soon felt the mixture of the alcohol and marijuana, my mind hazy, but not unpleasantly so.

We migrated to the living room after the game was done, Mykel having to catch me as I stumbled over the floor. I felt his propinquity next to me, the heat of his arm wrapped around my waist, stealing me. I found myself leaning into his hold. My hand coming to rest on his chest.

I closed my eyes, my head pressed into his shoulder.

It would be so easy...

I had not noticed we were standing still until he tugged lightly on me, whispering to come on. We walked to the couch and he set me lightly on it. The room spun lightly and I found myself leaning once more into him. I inhaled him. I both felt and heard his pulse speed up at my impingement, he inhaled sharply as my arm wound around his abdomen.

"Alright, boys," Liz said and stood up after rolling herself a before-bed snack, "it's late. And I have to go in tomorrow. And you, sir," she gave me a pointed look, "day after tomorrow, bright and early. I need you to open. Reagan can't do it."

I nodded. "Okay. Am...am I coming back here?" I asked her that every shift she took me to work. The truth was, I did not want to return to my sad, small existence. I enjoyed living with the two of them. To have people around who make me laugh. Who gives me reasons to laugh and smile.

Where I was shown love and affection, even in a platonic sense. They hugged me. And checked on me. And generally just...cared...

I didn't want to leave the security I found here. And I had the dooming premonition that when I finally came clean of my past...that would be it for me. I would have nothing else. I knew that I would not be able to rebuild once more from the devastating earthquake that would so destroy the foundation that I had been working so long to erect.

Liz smiled at me, indulgent and sad. She had repeated every time I asked that I could stay, that I was always welcome.

She knelt in front of me taking my hands in hers. "This weekend, how about this...we go get your stuff and you just stay."

My eyes widened. "What?"

Liz smiled patiently. "Well, baby, for the last two weeks or so you've asked me if you can stay. And you get this heartbroken look on your face like if I sent you back home I would be abandoning you like a puppy on the side of the freeway.

"I don't wanna see that look anymore. And besides that...I like having you here. And anyway...can you honestly look me in the eye and tell me you feel at home at and want to return to the apartment?"

I shook my head. "No. I don't like it there. I don't wanna go back," I whispered honestly. I did not want to go back. The quiet and overwhelming loneliness of that place crushed me. I had too much time to think there. Too much time to remember.

"Well, then don't." She stood and kissed my forehead. "Think about it, sweetie. G'night, boys."

I watched her go down the hall to her room and quietly closed the door. I took in her words from earlier that morning.

You're not going to lose me.

As the door closed I came to the effectuation that I was being watched. Under Mykel's scrutiny, I flushed, my head still pleasantly spinning from the drinks.

"Come on, you should go to bed."

I followed him up the stairs, reticent and pensive. I crawled into my bed, not bothering to undress or to get under the covers.

Mykel laughed and shook his head began to take off my shoes. "Come on, let's get you undressed. You don't want to sleep in your clothes."

Once down to my boxers he pulled the blanket over me. I grabbed his wrist as he stood and he looked at me curiously.

"Stay?" He looked at me and nodded slowly before getting in the bed beside me.

"I'm sorry," he said suddenly, "if I've scared you. I didn't mean to scare you or anything..."

I shook my head. "You didn't. It...it wasn't you that scared me, Mykel," I whispered slowly.

He nodded wanting to ask but unsure. I knew that it was time. If I were going to take Liz on her offer, I had to know. They had to know. Mykel had to know. I took a deep breath in hopes that the inebriation would help me through this upcoming dialogue.

"Can I ask then what did? Can I ask why you've been avoiding me now?"

I sighed. "I'm scared, Mykel."

"Of what?" he questioned gently, placing his fingertips over mine.

I chuckled, stodgy and weathered. "Of everything."

"Give me a specific."

"You...I've never met anyone like you before. You're..." I sighed. "I've never had anyone. No one has ever loved me. No one was ever really kind. And...I'm scared that now that I've found...I'm scared I'm going to lose everything I'm trying to gain."

"What's that?" His wheat field eyes looked into my soul and for a moment I could not speak.

"What if I tell you about me...about my past...and you don't want me anymore. What if you realize how fucked up I really am and realize that I'm not worth the trouble? Wh-what if Liz and you can't look at me the same if you find out? What if you hate me?

"What if what they say is true?"

He frowned. "What who says is true, Mattie?"

"They always whisper to me. What they always told me. I'm nothing. I'm worthless. I'm not good enough to be loved by anyone. Why would anyone love me anyway?"

I looked down not wanting to see pity in his eyes.

"Why wouldn't you be good enough to be loved, mon bonheur?"

His voice was so soft, his touch so exalting it made my chest ache.

"Wh-who could ever love a whore? A beaten, broken nothing whose only worth is what someone will pay." I laughed again, tears in my eyes. "Sometimes they didn't even pay. They just held me down and used me."

"When was this?" He asked gently, his thumb languidly running over the back of my hand. I watched his thumb travel back and forth, ruminating the feeling of his warmth.

"When I ran away from my parents. I was tired of being beaten. Every day, Mykel..." I sat up then, my knees resting up against his rib cage. He wrapped his arm around my leg, the simple touch revivifying.

"I was sixteen. They'd beaten me and left me unconscious on the living room floor. When I came to they weren't home. So I took that opportunity and ran." I wiped my eyes. "I was hungry. Eventually, I came to the city and was eating out of dumpsters. The first...kinda just happened, you know? I...there was a businessman...a rich man...I asked him for some money for food...he propositioned me to give him a blowjob. I did. He gave me a hundred bucks."

I couldn't look at him, shame filling every molecule that consisted of my entire make-up.

I wiped at my eyes. "Don't you see? I'm nothing."

"Mon bonheur, I don't care about your past. You did what you had to do to survive. I'd never think less of you for it. You were just a kid."

I sniffled. "What does that mean?" I looked at him then.

He smiled slightly and shyly looked away. "It means 'my happiness'."

"How do you know?"

"Know what?" he asked me. His eyes were dark in the dim room. But I saw his expression change quickly.

"That I'm your happiness?"

"Because...the first time I saw you I...felt my heart start to beat again. Just being near you makes me happy. For the first time in a long time, I could really smile."

"Tell me about Kaiden."

His eyes clouded with pain at that name and he looked away. There was so much written on his face, so much heartache, that I regretted the inquiry immediately.

He laid back on his back, resigned. He knew it was only fair. We both have to give to get.

"Kaiden...he's...dead. He's dead because of me." His voice was low and monotone. He did not look at me as he spoke. He closed his eyes against the world, against me. He did not want to talk about it, I could tell. I sat quiet, studying him, the rigidness of his body, the clenching of his fists.

"He's dead because I wasn't strong enough to protect him. He's dead because of me."

He opened his eyes then and looked at me, pain reflecting back at me as he gave me access to the turmoil in his heart.

"We had gotten into an argument after, uh, after he'd come out to his dad. Things got pretty heated and I walked out. I mean, I wasn't leaving him, I just needed some air. I was only gone for about an hour.

"Went for a walk, you know, to calm down...but...by the time I got home he, uh, he was gone." He stopped speaking, his face scrunching, his eyes squeezed shut.

"I'm sorry, Mattie, I can't..." He was up and out of the room before I had a chance to fully process what happened.

I gave chase after him but I only found Liz. She was standing in the kitchen unable to sleep, looking perplexed.

The back door was standing wide open, swinging slightly on its hinges from the force of being thrown open.

"What happened?" she asked me. Confusion marked her voice, a frown marring her brow.

"We were talking. I...asked about Kaiden."

I heard her sigh and she looked out the back door where Mykel had run.

"It's still a difficult subject for him. He still can't even really remember the good times without breaking down." She looked back toward the door.

"Should we go after him?" I asked her, feeling wretched for having even asked about this late lover that still held Mykel's heart. And that was another thing.

Am I just a replacement? A stepping stone to healing from a broken heart?

She shook her head. "No. Not yet. Come outside with me. I'll tell you about Kaiden." She grabbed her coffee and the box that had been left on the kitchen table and walked outside, not bothering to check if I was trailing her. She already knew.